


Choose to Run Away with Me

by Snacktivist



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, With A Twist, Zarlie is the superior ship don't worry, but also Avalance, it gets a bit political sorry not sorry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-05-15
Packaged: 2020-03-06 01:51:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18841207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snacktivist/pseuds/Snacktivist
Summary: A soulmate exists for everybody and a mark on your body helps you find them. But not all marks are equal.Or,Charlie - an artist and a bartender who's had her fair share of love affairs - has recently moved across the pond. That same night Zari, ever so doubtful when it comes to love, saw her soulmate's mark finally change.In the same city lives Sara, who's Zari's best friend and a screw up with no goals and a soulmate nowhere in sight - until she gets near Ava, a high-ranking government official with a defect.





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is an introduction to what started out as a why-the-heck-not romance fic idea but got big and complex and I fell in love with it. I hope you'll enjoy it too.  
> Shoutout to denouement for helping me make this world work and to Notabeautifullittlefool for editing.

It woke her up at night, the light tingling sensation on the back of her hand. She slowly sat up, but her mind was still hazy from having been woken up so recently and she couldn’t quite put her finger on what was happening. She scratched her chin, took a moment to push her hair away from her face, then stretched her arm to turn the lamp on her nightstand on. With the light on, she was finally able to look at her hand to see what was going on.

It was changing.

It hadn’t changed in quite a while, and even when it previously did, the changes were always small, often barely noticeable. But this time, they were so extensive she could clearly feel the skin on her hand transforming. The sensation was striking enough to wake her up. The abstract pattern now extended from below her wrist to the base of her hand, and it was still reshaping, filling up and spreading, slowly but surely.

It resembled something between a map and some sort of a tribal tattoo. The pattern was always different, unique to everybody. Some people would swear their mark had a specific shape that had a meaning. Some saw an animal, a flower, or a shape of a country. Hers was just... a random and a very abstract pattern. Fairly pretty, but still random.

She harshly scratched the place where a new line of the mark was forming. Skin in that place was slowly rising to hug an invisible crescent moon and growing paler in the process. Because her mark was lighter than her skin tone, it resembled a very elaborate scar. Some marks were like that, and some people took advantage of that to create their own. They would carve ornaments into their skin with knives or pay someone else to do it. These marks didn’t work, of course, they were just fakes meant to improve the social standing of their bearers by deceit. There were even artists for that, skilful professionals. Illegal professionals, naturally, but professionals, nonetheless. She understood their motives, or at least she thought she did, but she also wouldn’t be above choosing not to have the soulmate’s mark if she could. Or maybe she was just tired and irritated.

She sighed.

Her mark kept on changing. There was no set ratio of how exactly geographical distance between soulmates reflected the size of a soulmate’s mark; all that was known was that the two are related and inversely proportional. And her mark kept growing. After all these years of almost nothing, it was growing.

She got up and left her room to get a glass of water, passing her brother’s room on the way. Downstairs, she sat down on a highchair at the kitchen island, then remembered what she came here to do, got her glass of water and sat down again.

So this was it. She might meet them soon. Sometimes she wondered what they would be like. She tried not to because that created expectations that she did not want to have, but it was hard to avoid imagining them altogether. Her parents will be thrilled. Maybe she shouldn’t tell them. She probably shouldn’t tell them.

There was a hair on her glass. Why did she have so much hair? It got everywhere. And what kind of hair would her soulmate have, would it be long or short and dark like hers or light like their mark or-

She shook her head. This was stupid. It could be anyone, and she was well aware that your soulmate is often nothing like what you’d imagine. No, Zari, no expectations. No expectations from her, that is. The same couldn’t be said for her family. Her family had many expectations, indeed. She could try to hide the change from them, but there was no way she could do it for long.  Her mother will be over the moon. Her father slightly concerned about who her soulmate would turn out to be. Where are they now? In the same state, maybe? And since they were obviously traveling long distance, could they maybe do it some other time? Like during the day, so that she could get some sleep instead of having her mark keep her awake? Because right now, the itching was too intense to go back to bed.

So she got herself a possibly awful person that she would be basically forced to fall in love with and that also made her sleep deprived. Great. She adored her soulmate already.

She looked at her hand again - the mark was now covering a quarter of the back of her hand and still growing. If it grew significantly more, her parents might have her go and look for them, they wouldn’t want her to miss her window. Even though her “window” was more than sufficient to find her soulmate, she still had about 15 years till her mark would disappear. Around 40, it was bye bye soulmate, no way to tell who they were. Then she could be with whoever she wanted, which might at best be no one at all, and nobody would be able to present any objections.

But she couldn’t do that to her family. Not after all she’s already done to them. It would break their hearts. They want her to be with the best person she can possibly be with, and that is supposed to be her soulmate. Unless that soulmate doesn’t have a soulmate’s mark - unless what her soulmate has are lovers’ marks.

 

***

_Several weeks later_

 

Charlie leaned forward towards the bar, and a few seconds later leaned a bit more and a bit more until her chin was resting on it. Her gaze didn’t move much, only her body. Her eyes were fixated on one very specific spot. It was a good spot. A corner of the bar, she liked to look there - it was pretty, this evening especially. A bit darker than the rest of the bar, a spot to hide. Lovers would often go there to have little privacy, although that corner definitely did not provide as much privacy as they imagined. Not that Charlie minded, people could shag in their bar for all she cared, as long as they didn’t make too much of a mess and didn’t forget to pay. She would have to go back to work soon, but for now she wasn’t needed, and she could stay and feast her eyes.

“Charlie!”

A snap of fingers next to her ear woke her up and made her flinch.

“I’ve been trying to get your attention for probably a whole minute. You’ve been staring at her like this for God knows how long. Either go talk to her or get to work. Go serve drinks or wipe tables, anything, just quit staring at our customers like that.”

Charlie rolled her eyes at her boss. They had a good relationship; she was able to get away with worse things than eye rolling. She made sure her expression communicated just how annoyed she was with him, and pushed herself away from the bar to return to serving drinks and wiping tables, as she was told. Also taking money from people, that must have been her favourite part.

As she was working, she glanced towards the corner from time to time. She wouldn’t go there to talk to her. She didn’t sleep with or date her customers, that was against her rules. Unless the customers were particularly attractive and/or available, of course, in that case - who cares about the rules. This girl, though, she didn’t seem available. She spent about an hour there on her own, writing something in a notebook, barely looking up unless her colleague was serving her a drink that wasn’t even alcoholic. Her friends joined her later and she spent another few hours talking to them, again barely bothered by her surroundings, sipping on tea at 10 in the evening. This wasn’t the first time she was there - she came fairly regularly, actually. Charlie noticed.

Later, around 11, she got up, grabbed her things, and followed her friends as they were leaving. Charlie sighed, chased any unpleasant thoughts away before she had the time to focus on them, walked over to their table, cleaned it and collected the glasses. As she was placing them on the counter where one of her colleagues would wash them, she felt the need to scratch her forearm where her skin was itching slightly. She made a face and hurried up laying down the glasses.

Again.

She looked down at her arm to see a new line, about as long as a match and as thin as thread, only ever so slightly lighter than the skin around it. It may get much paler with time, though, she figured, as she was comparing its shade to the other marks on her skin. The others were older, a little thicker, and looked almost paperwhite in contrast with her otherwise dark complexion, which made them clearly visible. She wasn’t a fan of the colour that her marks had. She was not ashamed of them, that was never the case no matter what some people might think, but she didn’t like how easily a complete stranger could count all the times she fell in love. There was always the option to cover them up with sleeves, as many people chose to. However, Charlie made it a point not to do that, as it might make it look as if she felt shame for bearing lovers’ marks.

She looked up from the new, so far not permanently settled, mark. She wasn’t even sure who caused this one, it could’ve been the girl from the corner of their bar, maybe, but honestly, it could just as well be the bloke she woke up next to this morning. Or the person who gave her their number today after twenty minutes of blatant flirting. They were very attractive. Big brown eyes, lips she was dying to kiss. And a decent bum, too. She wouldn’t mind them being the reason behind her mark, actually. She could imagine waking up next to them on a few mornings, for a few weeks maybe even.

She continued thinking about the new mark appearing on her arm as she was pouring drinks. One of her customers, one she hasn’t seen in the bar yet, noticed the many marks on her arm and seemed impressed. He even lifted his arm and turned it so that she could see his; she quickly counted 17 of them. She was impressed as well, winked at him, and poured his glass a little fuller than she was supposed to because she supported people who wore their marks proudly.

A couple – in their early twenties, she estimated, and waiting to order - noticed those gestures and looked appalled. The two, a short woman and a tall man, looked at each other before the girl crinkled up her nose in distaste and the man sent a glare Charlie’s way; immediately after that they both turned around to leave. Charlie glanced at their intertwined hands, as they were heading out of the door. Their pale complexions made the dark ornaments on both their hands easily visible: they were elaborate, covering most of their hands and matching in colour.

As she turned around to serve another customer, a thought flew through her mind about how those elitist freaks can go fuck themselves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading this short intro, and please let me know what you think!  
> More characters and a properly long chapter follow.


	2. What Do You Know About Love?

That morning happened too quickly for Sara's liking. She had come home quite late last night, hadn’t bothered to take her makeup off, gone to bed and slept for only about four hours before she was woken up by a text. That made her get up, take a shower, look over her messy living room and conclude there was no saving it, and then sit on the couch and take her phone to send a text.

_Where are you?_

_I’ll be there in 5._

_Cool._

Sara was currently jobless, which meant she had nowhere to be besides here, waiting for Zari to show up like she sometimes randomly decided to. She wasn’t lying, and in about five minutes Sara heard keys rattle in the door, which made her pull her brows together and wonder how that could be happening and why did-

“Hey.” Zari marched in and placed two travel mugs on the coffee table, then proceeded to pull a box of food out of her bag.

“You have the keys to my apartment?”

“Yeah,” she replied casually.

Sara paused, looked her up and down, and decided to let it go for now and grabbed one of the mugs, as Zari was still wrestling with her bag.

When the food was finally laid on the coffee table, Sara had already drunk half of the coffee and Zari finally took hers and sat down next to her.

“So how come you have my keys?”

“Oh, right. Last week, when you were real drunk, you had copies of the keys made for me in case you die, so that I could find your body and feed the cat.”

“Did I really say that?”

“I believe your exact words were: ‘Z, if I suddenly die, I need you to find my body and make sure that bastard isn’t hungry, cause otherwise he’d eat me.’”

Sara paused for a moment, took a sip of her coffee, and nodded. “That sounds accurate, yeah.”

Zari smirked amusedly and opened the box that was lying on the table to offer Sara the diced fruit and nuts that were inside, afterwards she took some herself.

“I can’t believe you actually took the time to cut the fruit,” Sara commented as she was eating.

The remark made Zari shrug. “I’m a great friend like that.”

After this brief conversation, they ate breakfast and drank their coffees in silence. In the meantime, a ginger cat with only one eye and three legs peeked in through the open window and for a moment pondered consequences of joining the two women in the apartment before walking in. It went straight to a small bowl with cat food that was placed in the kitchen corner, next to the fridge. Sara seemed to barely register the animal’s presence, but on Zari’s face it conjured up a smile. They both left it be, however, and enjoy its breakfast while they were focusing on theirs.

 

When Sara was standing in front of the kitchen sink drying up the two travel mugs with a towel after she rinsed them, Zari spoke again.

“Any change?”

The movement of Sara’s hands ceased, and the wet towel lay dead in her palms before she organised her thoughts and placed it on the kitchen isle. “Not really,” she answered briefly.

Zari chose not to push for more information and instead leaned down to help the cat on to her lap. The cat immediately started to purr, and Zari listened and gently stroked its fur.

Sara glanced at her hand where her mark was, and then quickly distracted herself by picking up a brush from the coffee table - where it wasn’t supposed to be but whatever - and brushing her hair, still wet from the shower.

As she was doing so, she returned to the topic that Zari had already broached and turned it around. “Did you tell your parents?”

Zari shrugged and focused on the cat on her lap for a little longer before she answered verbally. “No, but they saw it.”

“How did that go?”

“Well... mum baked cake.”

Sara stifled her laughter. “Did she... she seriously baked cake because your soulmark grew?”

Zari only nodded.

“That’s... good for you. I bet it was a good cake.”

“I can see how much you want to laugh. Stop making fun of me. This is serious.”

Sara rubbed her lips together and nodded, as she kept on fighting against a fit of laughter. “Sure, Z.”

“Anyway.” Zari took a deep breath and scratched the one-eyed cat between its ears. “I actually wanted to talk to you about this.”

Sara wanted to roll her eyes but chose not to. What she didn’t stop herself from doing was looking down at the mark on her hand. It was spread around her wrist and quite dark and hadn’t changed much ever since she could remember. She didn’t really recall ever not having it, and she didn’t remember it ever being much different than it was now either. Sometimes a few details here and there disappeared and appeared again, now and again a more significant change would occur for a while until the mark reverted to its previous state. That was it. Not that it mattered, this whole soulmate thing was bullshit, really. She preferred her life as it was, her freedom unrestrained, and the last thing she needed in her already stupid situation was a person unconditionally in love with her, a person she was responsible for. That silly cat was a chain heavy enough on its own, thank you very much.

She looked at Zari, her eyes questioning her friend’s intentions.

“You know, you could try going to the Database Centre to find them.”

“I didn’t think you’d support that.”

“I don’t, but...,” Zari shrugged, “It could work. They already have your data, don’t they?”

“Yeah, my dad took me there when I was little.”

“Mine too.”

“ _Your parents_ are into that?”

Zari laughed dryly. “No, but it’s obligatory if you want citizenship.”

“Is it? That’s fucked up, isn’t it?

“Honestly, what about the marks isn’t.”

“That’s true,” Sara nodded, then stopped talking and leaned towards the cat to pet it.

Zari noticed and changed the topic. “Did you name him already?”

“Yeah, I named him a long time ago, the name’s Cat.” She took the cat and pulled him into an embrace as the animal kept on purring, happy to be getting this much affection.

Zari raised her eyebrows. “Cat?”

“Yeah.”

“Seriously? Couldn’t you name him at least Ginger or something?”

“He doesn’t belong to me, I don’t have the right to name him like that. He’s a cat and that’s what I’m calling him.”

Zari tilted her head to the side and didn’t need to repeat ‘Seriously?’ for Sara to hear her voice in her head.

“Hey,” she pronounced emphatically. “He decided he would partially live here, that’s cool, but it doesn’t mean he’s my cat. I don’t have a cat. And I don’t get to name a cat that I don’t have.”

“Sure, Sara.”

Sara sighed and chose to not to reply to that, as from there on Zari could only get more sarcastic, never less.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, each pondering their own situation and issues, before Zari returned to their previous topic.

“So, the Database Centre?”

“Isn’t it stupid?”

“It’s not like you have anything to lose.”

Sara smirked. “True.”

“So, I’d say it’s worth a shot.”

“Maybe.”

“And it’s not like you have anything better to do,” Zari noted matter-of-factly.

“I could be looking for a job.”

“We both know you’re not going to do that today, since you only quit the last one yesterday.”

“I totally was going to look for a job today.”

Zari chuckled.

“But now I have something else to do, so I’m not going to.”

That shut Zari up, she only smiled amusedly, because she didn’t want Sara to change her mind.

“And how are you doing?” She wasn’t looking at Zari when she said that, her attention was diverted to the cat in her lap, as he was doing everything in his power to usurp all of it - rubbing his head against Sara’s hands and arms, purring loudly, and was seemingly punishing any moment lacking in attention by digging his delicate claws into her thighs.

Zari sighed, put her hands in her lap and went silent for a few seconds before deciding to answer. “I’m alright.”

“With your mark being... like that? Are you, Z?”

Both women glanced at the mentioned mark, which was now covering half of Zari’s hand with its intricate details.

She put her other hand over it to hide it. “I don’t know, Sara. It hasn’t changed much since a few weeks ago.”

“Does that scare you?”

She shrugged, lowered her gaze, moved a bit on the couch, and sighed.

Sara gave her a moment to consider whether to speak or not, and when Zari didn’t say anything, she continued herself. “It’s okay, we don’t have to talk about it, I’m sorry.” Then she gave her a smile, brief and friendly, even if forced. This wasn’t something she found easy to smile at.

But it was the smile encouraged the other woman to speak. “It’s just that it will only make things more complicated.”

“You don’t have to do this just for your parents, Zari. It’s your life, too.”

“They just want to see me happy. I can’t go against that.”

“No, you can’t, so you should do what makes _you_ happy.”

“Sara.”

“Zari?”

“I don’t even know what would make me happy. And this was always a big deal to them and now it’s even more important. And they deserve to be happy, too. I owe them this much.”

“You don’t owe them anything.”

“You know I do.”

“No, you don’t. Zari...,” Sara paused, bit her lip, looked into her eyes and sighed. “We’ve been over this, it wasn’t your fault.”

When no answer came, Sara asked another question. “So did you tell Nate?”

“Tell Nate what?” Zari’s expression changed to oblivious.

“That your mark changed.”

“No, why would I-“ she froze, suddenly there was a look of horror on her face. “I forgot Nate!”

“You can still tell him, it’s fine.”

“No, I mean, I literally _forgot_ Nate. He was supposed to come back today, right?! I completely forgot!”

Sara burst into laughter so loud that the cat jumped away from her and hid under the coffee table. “This is what, like the tenth time? Oh my God, Zari!”

“Shut up!” She hurriedly got up from the couch and started gathering her belongings. “It only happened like twice!”

Sara’s laugh wasn’t showing any signs of stopping. “He should really break up with you.”

“He can’t break up with me, we’re not dating!”

“Sure, Zari,” she started laughing louder.

“You know what? I was going to ask you how you were doing, but now no one cares.”

Sara put every bit of her self-control into stopping her laughter, then lifted a thumb and an index finger to form a gun, and shot herself in the heart.

That made Zari roll her eyes dramatically as she pulled her bag over her shoulder. “Yeah, nice, now that you’re applying for jobs _again_ , maybe you should give theatre a shot. They called and asked for New York City’s most over the top drama queen,” she retorted and headed towards the door.

And Sara started laughing again, partially in disbelief, while the poor cat was still crouching under the table. “So _I_ am the drama queen here? _Me_ , when you exist?”

Zari picked up a bra that was, for reasons inexplicable to her, lying on a shoe cabinet next to the door – and for a second wondered why did Sara own a shoe cabinet when her shoes were everywhere but in the cabinet – and threw the bra at Sara’s face. “Suck it, Lance!”

“Go choke!” Sara roared after her just as the door was closing.

And as soon as the door fully closed, the laughter stopped.

Sara took a deep breath and threw her back on the couch to lie down. Suddenly she was alone and suddenly nothing was funny.

She closed her eyes as the cat climbed back up on the couch and settled on her stomach.

She would go to the Database Centre soon, but not just yet.

She could lie here, just for a bit, there was no rush. No point in rushing, anyway. There was no destination to reach, no goal.

She lifted her hand and started stroking the cat’s fur.

At least this little guy seemed happy.

It was almost inspiring, how cool he managed to be even with half of the eyes and three quarters of the legs he was supposed to have. Well, maybe more than three quarters, he did have a little stub right where one of his hind legs used to be. The guy was pretty brave. Although, maybe it was just that cats truly had nine lives.

She certainly didn’t have nine lives.

And she was happy about that, frankly, because already her first life was too long.

Or maybe it just felt that way because of how she was just... surviving. That was the word. She was doing survival really well, she was proud of that. She always got out of every mess. Which was perhaps made less impressive by the fact that she usually created the mess herself.

She sighed.

She would go to the Database Centre because she told Zari that’s what she would do and because there was nothing better to do anyway. She didn’t expect to find her soulmate that way, she didn’t even want to find them, not really. Love brings the duty of care, and that was nothing for her.

“You wouldn’t want to be responsible like that either, would you?” she asked the cat without opening her eyes to look at it and caught herself almost expecting an answer.

The cat purred.

“No, I bet you wouldn’t. You just want food and someone to pet you when _you_ feel like it. All cats are like that. Cats are jerks. You included.”

She opened her eyes and lifted her head, glared at the cat.

“You are a jerk.”

The cat kept on purring soothingly.

“And now I’m insulting a stupid cat.” She laid her head down again but didn’t stop petting the animal.

It was inspiring just how unbothered the cat was. The cat didn’t have a goal either, which in a way meant there were no consequences to its actions. It just one day decided it would show up on the fire escape outside of Sara’s living room, invite itself in, and when Sara fed it ham, it must have concluded it would be wise to come back often, and so it did. And Sara fed it, even bought it cat food. Sometimes the cat and her even cuddled. And that was it. It was a gratifying relationship. Similar to the ones she had with most people. Those that she’d have sex with when it fit her and afterwards wouldn’t call again. Or would, if the sex was good and she felt like it. She was sure that if she fell dead in the streets one day, the cat would just move on, perhaps up the fire escape to a different apartment where someone else would feed it and occasionally cuddle it. Just like Sara wouldn’t give the slightest of fucks if the cat just... disappeared. Which it will probably do eventually, when someone feeds it better food. It better do that, anyway. Sara wasn’t the type of person one should foster affection for, not even a cat. Well, especially not a cat, since she didn’t like cats.

But this cat was kind of special. It seemed to be missing a family. They had that in common. The cat was also missing an eye and a leg, Sara still had those, but who knew what was in store for her. Sometimes she was surprised that she was still alive, much less that she still had all of her limbs with all the trouble and fights she got to.

She would like to think the cat had a big falling out with its family too. That the cat was a Casanova before it lost the eye and leg and slept with his sister’s boyfriend, which made his whole family turn against him, so he moved into his own place and-

This was a cat she was thinking about; it didn’t have its own place. Which was actually not even the most ridiculous thing about the whole concept.

Laurel.

She turned around to lie on her stomach and buried her face in a pillow that was on the couch.

She shouldn’t be thinking about this, but she couldn’t help it.

She missed them sometimes.

Even though her situation was not without advantages. She could do what she wanted and nobody would be disappointed. Like when she came home at four in the morning last night after spending most of her last paycheck at a party right after she quit her last retail job because, frankly, it sucked.

She wasn’t planning another party today, though. After she went to the Database Centre, she would get herself someone to spend the night with. Preferably with a soulmate’s mark of a different colour than her own because that excluded long term attachment. Not someone with lovers’ marks. Because those meant she would have to spend at least half an hour actually talking to them before anything could happen to find out if a new mark starts forming on their arm. She had that figured out. In her experience, if no mark started showing up within the first half hour, they were good to go. It wasn’t that marks couldn’t appear later, she knew that, but it made the likelihood smaller, and that had to be enough. She wasn’t in the business of breaking people’s hearts.

She did meet this crazy person once that she spent the night with and let them stay over only to find a new mark on their arm in the morning, in the exact tone her own mark was in. She kicked them out without even letting them put their clothes on properly. They must’ve been a psychopath. Then again, it was on her, since she did previously notice the person had dozens of marks already.

“You aren’t bothered with marks, your life is a lot easier even if you’re missing a leg, let’s be real.”

The cat looked up just as she did and for a moment they were gazing into each other’s eyes, as if the animal indeed understood everything she was saying until now.

When she averted her eyes, she shook her head, put the cat away and got up. It was time to put proper clothes on to go out. She chose simple jeans, long sleeved t-shirt and a light jacket, put her hair up in a ponytail and did her make up. She wasn’t nervous about going to the Database Centre, she wouldn’t let herself be nervous. There was nothing to be nervous about, since none of this mattered.

 

Right above the information desk, there were big letters DCMP painted in all colours of the rainbow and hanging from the ceiling on strong wires. On the information desk and name tags of the employees, the whole title was written, which was Database Center for Marks and Pairings. The building was mostly white with various multicoloured details, like a few of the pillars supporting the building’s high ceiling, where a several metres long soulmate’s mark was painted with seven different colours. On one of the walls, there was a couple of metres tall screens showing all the various pairs of soulmates that the DCMP strived to ‘help’. They took care to include diverse couples and people of various backgrounds, the vast majority of people shown, however, had conspicuous soulmate’s marks on their hands, and none of them had long sleeves, making all of the marks clearly visible. Some of their marks were even coloured, mainly golden, that was trendy, but Sara noticed one that was lime green too. That wasn’t her cup of tea, but she wasn’t judging.

She finally gathered the courage to walk over to the front desk and was greeted by a person with striking but skilfully done make up, short hair, sharp facial features and appealingly broad shoulders. The name tag said ‘Rory’.

“Hi,” she declared as if making a closing statement at a rally. Her resolution seemed to catch the person in front of her off guard.

“Hi, are you here to find your soulmate?”

Sara uncomfortably shifted her weight from one foot to the other, then nodded. “Yeah. You should already have my data.”

“Okay, wonderful. How long has it been since the last time you were here?”

“I don’t know, ten years?”

“Okay, so if you could please fill out this form and bring it back to me when you’re done,” they replied, smiled politely, handed her a piece of paper with a clipboard and a pen and pointed her to a few small differently coloured chairs and couches at the side of the room.

Sara chose to sit on a grey chair, as if to make a point to herself, propped the clipboard on her thigh and started writing. She filled out her name, date of birth, pronouns, chose the colour closest to that of her mark from the fifteen choices available and checked ‘soulmate’s mark’ next to where the form also provided the option ‘lovers’ marks’. She didn’t understand why she needed to do all that, and blamed bureaucracy. But she was already here, so she might as well cooperate.

From where she was sitting, she could see a stand with flyers, one of which caught her attention, since on the two men pictured kissing on it she considered very attractive. Were these actual soulmates or just hired models?

Okay, not now, Sara.

She finished up filling up her form and got up to bring it back. Rory at the front desk took a look at it, turned to their computer, and immediately after that, as if compelled by a sudden realisation, quickly turned back to Sara with his lips slightly parted, but before he spoke, he checked the top of her form again for information on how to address her.

“Uh, miss? Your mark.”

Sara frowned and looked down at her hand, then bit her lip. She wouldn’t have noticed.

She looked back at Rory, who smiled encouragingly.

And back at her hand.

On her wrist, near the centre of her mark, brand new fine dark lines were appearing, getting tangled together in a rounded pattern that to some people, not to her, might resemble a flower with bold veins in its petals. On the back of her hand, the thin lines were slowly spreading towards her fingers.

She wasn’t one of those who easily felt their marks changing, but now that she was looking at it, she noticed a faint tingling sensation. Her mark must have already grown to twice its original size. She didn’t recall this happening before. Not this much.

Sara mindlessly clenched her fists.

Her eyes met those of the employee that was still looking at her, and she was going to say something, but she wasn’t quite sure what.

“I’ll come back later,” she uttered in the end in the politest tone she mustered. Then she added a brief “Bye,” and turned around to leave.

She headed out of the door, and now that she had noticed it, the slight tingling at the back of her hand was impossible to ignore. When she was outside, she pulled the sleeves of her jacket as low as possible, even though she knew they would quickly go back up, and hid both her hands in the jacket’s pockets.

At the nearest crosswalk, she walked over to the other side of the road and changed direction, walking... she didn’t know where exactly. Her steps were longer and quicker than she realised, her breathing a little heavier than usual. She had not anticipated the effect that seeing her soulmark change so vastly had on her.

After a kilometre, two or maybe even three, she finally realised the tingling was gone. She stopped, moved over to the side of the sidewalk so as not to be in the way of other people, and pulled her hand out of the pocket. It was gone.

The changes, that is. The mark was more or less its usual size again.

For a moment she thought that maybe she dreamt it. Maybe she was still high from last night, but that really shouldn’t be how weed works.

She pulled her brows together, examined her hand more thoroughly.

It was definitely back to normal.

This finding made her look back in the direction she came from, where the Database Centre was.

She was no expert, but unless she dreamt it, this certainly made it look like her soulmate was somewhere in that building.

She pondered on that for a moment and soon decided that she was definitely going to find someone incredibly hot and reliable to blow her mind tonight. And after that she’d pay a visit to someone who poured good and strong drinks.

 

***

 

Zari slammed the car door faster than was good for the car and hurried towards a meeting point close to one of the arrivals halls at the airport.

Of course, he was already standing there.

“I am _so_ sorry.”

He laughed calmly, leaned down, pulled her close and hugged her.

She reciprocated the hug, kissed him quickly, then pulled away. “How late am I?”

“About twenty minutes.”

She paused, observed the amused expression on his face and bit her lip. “How late am I for real?”

“Two hours.”

“Oh wow.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s cool, Z, don’t worry.”

“You really aren’t angry?”

He shrugged, unbothered. “No.”

She smiled, her eyes lit up, and she leaned towards his suitcase to grab it, but he stopped her by gently slapping her hand as it was reaching out.

“No. Bad Zari. You’ve got to stop doing this, it’s emasculating. And don’t do that thing with your eyes, it makes them scary big.”

She rolled her eyes instead and pulled her hand back. “I had you wait here for two hours, I can at least do something for you.”

He answered by expressively staring at her for a few seconds.

“No,” she rolled her eyes again, “Dude.”

“No?”

“Stop it.”

“Okay, take my jacket then.”

“Great.” She took the heavy jacket that had been thrown over the suitcase, which simultaneously allowed her to hide the mark on her hand under it, and grabbed Nate’s hand with the other and headed towards her car, as he pulled the suitcase behind them.

 

The drive to his home was pleasant and peaceful. They talked about his month-long adventures in Europe before he fell asleep and she fell quiet to let him rest. At one point she rolled her eyes again, at herself, as she thought about how she forgot to come pick him up. Two hours late. That’s 120 minutes, which is a lot of minutes to be late. She didn’t quite understand how Nate was so calm about it, but she wasn’t going to complain. His parents would’ve picked him up, but they were busy organising one of their social events, so she offered to drive their son home instead. She was going to drop him off and afterwards go home and study, unless she ended up playing video games, and they might meet later that day. She wasn’t looking forward to that. Hanging out with Nate was great, but she wasn’t sure she was ready to talk about her mark changing when he notices, and that was just a matter of time. She was actually surprised that he hadn’t yet, but that was probably due to how tired he must’ve been after his trip. He texted her from the airport saying he didn’t sleep on the plane when she left Sara’s place to come pick him up and let him know she was on her way.

Nate stirred in his seat and she glanced over at him, then focused on the road again. He was wearing a short-sleeved t-shirt, which left the marks on his arm exposed. She focused on making a left turn, and glanced over at him again, this time looking at his arm specifically. Something was off.

She focused her gaze on the road again but kept the image of the marks on Nate’s arm in her head. There were three of them. Three marks next to each other, long and thick as matches, not very dark, but noticeably darker than his skin tone. That wasn’t right. Three was too few, right? But marks couldn’t disappear, or could they?

She looked at his arm once again, focusing on the marks longer than would be considered safe while she was behind the wheel, and looked back on the road just in time to not get them killed.

There were four marks just like there were supposed to be. She knew that, because the fourth mark was hers, while three came before her. She didn’t see the fourth at first because now it was significantly paler than the other lines. It was changing to match her own mark.

Oh, damnit.

 

***

 

Charlie was rolling around in her bed for about an hour before she finally got up. The bed was just too comfortable, not quite as good as in her family’s house in Surrey, but good enough. Who was she kidding, the mattress was bloody cheap and she could tell, but she was getting used to it. It was better to sleep on a bad mattress here than on any mattress there.

Her hair was a mess when she got up, but she wouldn’t deal with that now. She scratched her back, took a sip of water from the glass on her nightstand, and stretched a little. Next, she wrapped her body in a chequered bath robe so that she wouldn’t go to the kitchen naked, in case she met some of her roommates. She wouldn’t mind if they saw her body, she had nothing to be ashamed of, but they seemed to have a problem with it somehow. She found out accidentally, when she brought a bloke home about two weeks ago and a girl she was living with dropped and broke a glass the moment she saw them having midnight snacks naked in the living room to recharge. But Charlie was considerate, so the next day she bought two bathrobes to wear around the flat, one of them she occasionally let her visitors borrow.

Her throat felt dry. She rolled her tongue around in her mouth, crinkled her nose, and finally went to the kitchen, leaving the glass of water behind in her room to grab a new one later. After she filled up a glass, with only water, unfortunately, she downed it all in one go. It was 4pm, which meant she still had about five hours before she needed to go to work. She would use those up, she decided as she poured breakfast cereal in a bowl and drowned them in milk. She could go for a walk. Join a band. Or start a revolution. Anything was possible. She was in the city that never sleeps, after all. The Big Apple, they called it. She had no idea why. Maybe today was the day to find out. Or not, a revolution seemed more fun.

She ate the cereal so fast she barely chewed any of it and finished her breakfast by drinking the sweetened milk out of the bowl, wiped her mouth with her wrist and moved to the shower. The bowl stayed on the kitchen table.

She examined her tattoos while showering, as she often did, and considered getting a new one to mark her move to the states. She didn’t know what the new tattoo would be just yet, but something would come up. There was no rush. After the shower she dried her hair, well, mostly, because drying it completely would take too long and she didn’t have the patience, afterwards she styled it. That took long too, but not as long as it would take some other people, since she was basically a pro at this point. Her styling skills were something she was quite proud of. She chose an outfit with a skirt and fishnet stockings, finished off her look with makeup, a choker, and her favourite earrings that didn’t fit together but that she always made work. And before she left the apartment, she grabbed a bag with pencils and a sketchbook and stopped by the mirror in the hallway to notice that the person looking back at her was the bomb. And the bomb deserved a wink.

She walked for a few blocks, used public transport, and then walked some more. The air smelled absolutely awful, just like proper liberal city air should - she was in love with that, because no one here really seemed to care. No one here really seemed to care about anything, and she thought that beautiful. Where she was from, people would sometimes stare at her marks - whether it was because of how many she had or simply because they were lovers’ marks she never knew and never cared - the important thing was that here nobody paid attention. Well, apart from the occasional drones that existed everywhere, she assumed.

She got to the Central Park shortly after six, quickly chose a bench to sit on and took out her drawing supplies. Yet, after she did that, instead of starting to work on a sketch, she just leaned back and made herself comfortable with an intention to observe her surroundings for a moment. She breathed in the air and watched a couple fly by on roller skates. One had a purple coloured soulmate’s mark, the other had their arm covered with lovers’ marks, one of which was coloured purple as well. She smiled to herself a breathed out. People painting their marks to make them stand out, that was why she moved here. What a life.

When she was done revelling in freedom - it still felt so fresh - she opened her sketchbook, took a pencil, put her headphones on, played some music, and started to draw a sketch of the couple she just saw. She abandoned the idea of making their silhouettes elaborate after the first few lines, though, and chose to focus on adorning their bodies with colourful tattoos. Working with her trusted pencils again made her miss sketching. And tattooing. And seeing the look on people’s faces when they realised that all the annoying hours they spent having her poke needles in their skin were worth it.

She was fully concentrated on her work when she was suddenly interrupted by someone pulling down her headphones. Rude. She looked up, saw a pretty face smiling down at her, quickly glanced at their arm and took note of lovers’ marks, then looked back up.

“Can I help you?” she asked in a manner that made her irritation clear.

The girl immediately took a seat next to her. “Your drawing is really pretty. Could you draw me?” As she was speaking, she adjusted her floral dress so as to crease the fabric as little as possible.

Charlie sized her up before she answered. She had gorgeous blue eyes, her hair tied up in a bun and a bashful but warm smile. “Why not.”

 

When she handed her a quickly sketched caricature of her face, the girl giggled, thanked her, and handed Charlie a little box with a pink cupcake inside. Charlie chuckled, thanked her back and parted ways with her because it was time to go to work. She ate the alarmingly sweet cupcake on the subway, and as she was walking through to door of the bar, thought about how despite not knowing many people in the city just yet, she never felt less alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading and, as always, please let me know what you think. If you liked this, stay tuned for the next chapter and for Ava and some of the questions you might have answered.


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